It is desirable to provide in bath or shower room areas for a rapid, convenient means for the uniform heating of articles, such as, clothing or towels and the like as a preliminary to use. For example, in taking a bath or shower, a heating device or unit should be capable of heating or warming uniformly through several layers of towel over a period of a few minutes in order to at least warm the towel and in some cases remove moisture from the towel as a preliminary to use.
In the case of towel warming, problems arise when the towel is draped over a rod in that the midsection of the towel that is supported by the rod is compressed, rendering it difficult to flow warm air through it. In addition, due to the thickness and construction of towels, heat is not easily conducted through the towel.
Prior art warmers have hung a single section of a towel in front of a blower so that warm air is directed against one side of the towel. Such warmers generally rely on relatively slow heat conduction from one side of the towel to the other side to thoroughly warm the towel. Other warmers have placed a heating element within a perforated support mounted in a housing. In one such warmer, no provision has been made, however, for forcing air to flow over the towel from within the towel support nor around the support within the housing. As a result, the warming is relatively slow even though heat is transferred by convection, conduction and radiation.
Others have suspended towels on hollow rods that are supplied with warm air. The rods have had holes therein to permit air to flow down between pendant sections of the towel that is draped over the rod. In some cases, such rods have been provided with nozzles to increase the flow downwardly between the pendant sections of the towel. Uniform heating of the towel still takes relatively long because there is no controlled air flow over both sides of the towel. Similarly, where holes are provided around the circumference of such rods, the towels are only subject to warm air flow from the inside, which requires a relatively longer period of warming.
Other towel-warming devices have been in the form of racks having rods for hanging draped articles under a hood. A blower mounted in the hood above the articles blows air downwardly over the outsides of the articles. With this relative positioning of the rods and the blower, the hanging article prevents air from flowing against the inside surfaces of the article such that increased time is required to warm the article.
In other variations of units for warming articles, a curtain is hung from a support to surround articles that are hung freely from a bar of the support. A blower-heater below the articles directs warm air upwardly within the curtain across the freely hung articles. Because the articles hang freely from the bar, no provision is made to keep pendant sections of the articles apart nor to assure that the air flows over both sides of or through the articles.
Despite prior efforts to warm articles such as towels, the prior warming devices have operated relatively slowly, because air has been directed only along one side. Further, prior art warming devices have not efficiently directed warm air simultaneously onto the inner and outer surfaces of draped articles in such manner as to force warm air through the midsection that is draped over a support. In addition, prior art warmers that have been provided with doors to permit access to the inside of a chamber have not been provided with racks supported by the door, such that when the door is open the rack has not been presented for easy loading and unloading of the towel.
Representative patents illustrating the foregoing approaches are U.S. Pat. Nos. 2,668,368 to E. N. Jacobs; 2,835,049 to E. N. Jacobs; 2,815,585 to G. S. Thompson; 2,856,700 to N. B. Wales; 2,971,266 to V. G. Silva; 3,409,996 to F. G. Konstandt; 3,975,833 to C. Rothauser et al; 4,035,927 to J. Spiegel; 4,094,076 to F. M. Baslow; 4,117,309 to M. P. Cayley; and 4,180,919 to H. Baltes.